


bloom later

by espinosas



Category: The Maze Runner (Movies)
Genre: Fluff, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Newt Lives, lil bit of angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-06
Updated: 2018-04-06
Packaged: 2019-04-19 01:54:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14226555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/espinosas/pseuds/espinosas
Summary: Newt gets the cure, Minho and Thomas are unsurprisingly soft, and Gally gets the appreciation that he deserves.





	bloom later

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! Yes, this is another fic in which Newt lives and everything is absolutely fine because I refuse to accept otherwise. 
> 
> (I'm also procrastinating several other fics.. looking at you He's a Forest Fire.)

The first inkling Newt has that he’s alive is the hard, warm surface he’s leaned against. He soon realises it’s somebody’s torso, their breathing the only thing that he can hear. They feel distant, faraway, and yet, they consume his senses.

There’s a sturdy grip on his legs, another over his chest and pulling him close to them, thumb running over his shoulder. Both hands are trembling.

And, fuck, he definitely feels every fucking bit of pain now.

It’s strongest in his chest but each and every nerve in his body is on edge. It’s overwhelming, forcing itself into every vein and setting his body afire. It’s different to the flare, but he can’t put his finger on exactly why. The flare had promised angry shocks to each and every nerve as it climbed his body, until he felt nothing at all but numbing cold. Now? Merely ripples of angry heat climbing his insides.

He remembered Thomas’ arms around him the only thing that he felt as he fell. His hands holding him, breaking his fall and warmth seeping into his unfeeling core, his only anchor. He held onto that, refused to think of anything but that, and he found the pain was a little easier to ignore.

“You just hold on for me, alright?” is whispered above him, voice wavering. It’s Minho. Newt feels bile tickle at his throat, and all he wants is to comfort him as Minho is trying his best to do for him, but all he can do is stare up at him and watch as he sobs. “No fucking around, I need you to be okay, got that?”

Newt knows his cheeks dampen too, and he grips Minho’s wrist, not unlike the last time he saw him. He thinks he mumbles his name, but it comes out more as a rasp of vowels as more black spills from his lips and sticks to his face.

Still, Minho’s smile is unconvinced and heartbreaking, and he suspects is mostly to reassure him. He feels the other boy pick up the pace to the whirring that he assumes is the Berg.

Another pair of arms pull him up and the WCKD jacket is pulled from his sweaty frame. His blood still drips from it and he turns away to look back at Minho. He’s talking to Brenda as he attempts to wipe at the black surrounding his mouth, delicately so, his fingers shaking. His eyes don’t move from Newt’s once and he wishes he had the kind of energy to take the piss out of him for letting his mask slip.

Fry’s hand is in his hair and he thinks Minho is the one he can feel tracing the constellation of black and blue and red that makes up his hand, but it all feels so distant. As though he isn’t truly in control of his body, still. It isn’t the flare, he isn’t even reassuring himself, Tommy wouldn’t let that happen.

They crowd him, but he doesn’t miss the looks they keep sending behind them, nervous, and Gally averts his gaze to his feet when Newt’s head falls to the side and meets his gaze.

It hits him, then, _of course_ , and he ignores the way his head floods as he tries to move past them. He grunts out Thomas’ name, his voice nothing but a gurgle, and Fry pulls him back down with tears drying on his cheeks.

He presses a water bottle to Newt’s lips, and Newt revels in the way Minho’s chest rumbles with a silent chuckle when Newt rolls his eyes at their mothering. He grips the bottle and guzzles down the entire thing. Minho runs his thumb over his knuckles. Blood flakes off of his skin and collects on the mesh below.

“Why can’t I- Is Thomas- is he alright?” He rasps, throat torn apart. Dying does that, he supposed. Nobody meets his eyes, and Brenda even sniffs as she walks away.

Vince is the one who speaks as Minho looks to the floor, his blood. “Lay down, you’re barely conscious, kid. Thomas can wait.”

Minho’s head dips, and his hand replaces Fry’s in his hair. He takes a minute, and Newt lets him, blunt nails scratching his scalp and fear brimming underneath the surface. “Min?”

“He was shot, he’s out cold. Janson-”

Newt doesn’t hear the rest because he’s pulling himself out of the cot, straight towards the other end of the hanger as bile swims in his stomach. Minho makes no move to stop him, call of his name dying in his throat, and isn't that ironic.

He’s being attended to by Jorge and Gally, his bare chest blotted with scrapes and bruises. His chest wound is dressed, as is the place where he assumes he got shot.

Newt lifts a shaking hand to Thomas’ face, relaxed and free of worry for the first time since they’d met, to push hair out of his face. Blood is crusted in his hairline, mixing with the dirt that coats his skin. Newt trailed his thumb over the space between his brows, still creased together.

_It should’ve been me_ , he whispers into Thomas’ shoulder. He curls up at Thomas’ side, pathetic and small as his body wracked with sobs. The irregular rise and fall of his chest beneath Newt’s palm is all that somewhat grounds him.

_It was meant to be me_.

+

He wakes to Minho’s hand carding through his hair again and hot breath in his ear, arm thrown across his middle. They’re strewn across the cot he recognises from before, pulled up next to Thomas’.

Minho smiles against his temple as he yawns his way into consciousness. Newt allows the smile into the pillow that makes its way to his face, despite how foreign it feels. He grips the hand that brushes his sternum and runs his thumb across the back, over each dirtied knuckle before sitting up. He pulled himself up, Minho’s hands settling under his arms to help.

Thomas is peaceful, or he appears to be, chest rising and falling in equal measure now. His face and chest are clean and the worry in his stomach settles.

He averts his eyes to Minho beside him and Brenda sat on a chair nearby, sharing apple slices. Brenda passes him another, and he smiles as he takes a bite.

“How y’doing?”

Newt shrugged. How did he feel?

He ached, limbs full of tar and his head heavy. Salt still tracked his cheeks, but Thomas was breathing normally. And they were both alive, Minho was alive, somehow.

“I’m not sure,” He drummed at his leg, faltering when he realised he was now clad in clean clothes. He suspected Brenda had something to do with it. He turned back to Minho, and the reach for his hand, intertwine of their fingers, came naturally. “I’m grateful. Both times, you didn’t have to, and you did.”

“I had to.” Minho’s expression softens as he runs his thumb over Newt’s wrist. A sad smile twists up his face and accentuates the purple under his eyes. “When’re you gonna get it into your thick head that we're in this together, huh?”

“He went back because of you, you know,” Brenda tells him, biting into her lip. She isn’t even looking at him, instead the boy asleep beside him. “Teresa- she said she could cure you if he did.”

Minho cuts in, sad eyes skitting between he and Thomas. “Shank nearly got himself killed for it but Teresa actually- she gave him serum from his blood before she died. It was only for you. It was what I injected you with when I found you, just before you woke up.”

“Oh my God,” is all that he can manage in response as his chest fills with dread. “I spent so long hating her and she- _oh my God_. She’s the reason I’m here?”

Minho’s hand twitches in Newt’s and he presses his lips together before he tries a reassuring grin. Newt knows otherwise, can tell he’s nervous beneath a tough exterior he’s been able to crack for years, now. Newt lets Minho try to comfort him, knowing that he needs it as much as Newt does, maybe even more.

“She pushed Thomas onto the Berg, she knew she was gonna die, alright?” Minho swallowed, jaw clenched. “I hate her. But she saved you. Funny how that shit works out.”

Newt’s head fell to his shoulder, his hand brushing his wound as he did so, and he stifled a groan. Brenda and Minho shared a look as he did so. Minho squeezed his hand, “You need anything?”

“Stop mothering me, you bloody idiot.” Brenda snorts, narrowing her eyes when Minho pushed at her knee as she got up to leave, squeezing Newt’s shoulder as she did so. “I’m just- I actually don’t know. I hurt him, Min. He was crying, sobbing. He let me hurt him. Over and over. He kept telling me it was alright while I had a knife in his fucking chest and I couldn’t do anything but watch.”

“It wasn’t you,” Minho presses, eyes fiery. “He loves you, and I know he doesn’t blame you for any of it. You hearing me?”  
  
“Thought I told you to stop mothering me.”

Minho smirked. “Sorry, princess.”

“ _Shut up_ ,” Thomas groaned into the pillow, hissing as his wound brushes the firm mattress beneath him.

Minho leans forward to help him up as Newt makes a grab for the water that Brenda had left, pressing it to chapped lips. Thomas opens his eyes, and it’s a good job he guzzled the drink, because he drops the cup when his gaze meets Newt’s.

“How-” His voice halts as his eyes flood, lips wavering and Newt clambers over to him. Thomas moves to hold him immediately, pressing wet lips to his temple and tangling his fingers in his hair. Newt grins in spite of how he feels his own cheeks wet.

Thomas pulls back, enough to gawk at Newt again and the Brit barely contains the bubble of shocked laughter in his throat. Thomas tangles his fingers in Newt’s nape and watches his eyes flutter with a grin of disbelief.

“I can’t believe this, I- I thought I lost you,” Thomas trembles despite the smile that hasn't seemed to leave his face, and he cups Newt’s cheek. His thumb traces over his cheekbone, and Newt’s eyes slip shut.

Minho clears his throat, outrageously so, and Newt turns to glare at him. Thomas smiles against his jaw, seemingly unaware of the eyes of most of the hangar on the three of them, and pulls Minho into their bubble. The Asian laughs, arms snaking around each of their waists, and Newt feels at home again.

“Minho found me,” Newt explains, blinking away visions of vines and veins and impending doom on his eyelids, eyes shining. “We seem to be making a habit of this, huh, Tommy?"

Tremors still wrack Thomas’ body, but he’s grinning, face close enough to Newt’s that he can feel his breath fanning his cheek. Minho runs his hand in circles between Thomas’ shoulder blades, his other hand on Newt’s hip, and he isn’t bothering to put up a facade now. Instead, he watches the both of them with half-closed eyes, smile small and genuine and beautiful.

“I thought I’d lost the both of you,” He mumbles, and the lack of sarcasm in the company of anyone else but the two of them is almost foreign to Newt. Thomas squeezes his shoulder, hand dropping to take Newt’s again.

Newt spots Gally when he drags his gaze away from Thomas for the first time, and notes that the other boy is smiling too. It falters when he meets Newt’s eye, and he wonders if he thinks he's allowed to be happy for them.

+

“Do you think the safe haven will have pancakes this good?” Minho inquires, poking at the last one on his plate, swimming in syrup. Thomas’ don’t fare much better, instead caked in honey. Newt pulls a face at them both, cutting his own into equal squares and making Minho snort.

They’re sat at the end of the boat, watching the coast get increasingly smaller as the ocean embraces them and pulls them into it's jaws. It should terrify Newt, being so exposed and out in the open, so out of control, but every passing wave is a reminder that he might just be okay.

“Sure,” Frypan squeezes in beside them, followed by Brenda and Gally on the end. “If you can whip me up eggs and flour from nowhere.”

Minho leans forward, elbows on his knees, to raise a brow at him. He pops the last of his food into his mouth, speaking around it. “Dude, I can personally guarantee that I will search the entire place every day of my damn life as long as you make these again.”

“Actually, Brenda did most of the work. I just added the flour,” She winks at Minho as he pouts. Thomas’ eyes, however, are firmly on Newt’s plate. “She’s pretty great, I was thinking of early retirement.”

“Don’t you dare,” Thomas cuts in, his already consumed as he continues to watch Newt’s food. Newt sighs, forking at the food and pushing it past Thomas’ lips. He grins as he chews, pressing a kiss to Newt’s jaw that he's not sure if it disgusts or endears him. He yelps when Brenda kicks at his leg with a curse. “I need your bacon.”

“Food is rationed for a reason, you ass.”

Newt pats his arm, “He needs to up his strength as he recovers. Aye, Tommy?”

“And you don’t?” Minho cuts in before he furrows his brows, regarding all of them. “Actually, I was drained for months. I deserve it more than either of you.”

Frypan shakes his head, heading off to the kitchen with mumbles of glader curses on his tongue. Harriet waves Brenda over and she disappears with a bow of her head and a thin excuse for an apology.

“Here,” Gally offers to Newt, his plate still mostly full as he munches on an apple instead. At Newt’s raised brow - and Minho and Thomas’ whines- he shrugs, “Think of it as a thanks for saving my face from Greenie here.”

Thomas’ face settles into something a little more serious, and when Gally’s gaze falls to the floor as he stands, Thomas does too. He leads the taller boy a little bit ahead of where they're sat.

“It's alright,” Newt thinks he hears him say, and he fails to catch the rest.

Minho’s head falls to his shoulder, soft lips pressed to the point that it meets his neck before he settles on watching the water below.

“Y'know,” Newt voices, and Minho hums for him to continue, “I'm glad we got thrown into the glade. Screw WCKD, and their gobshite science and their city, screw all of it. I’m just glad we all found each other in this.”

“You're getting damn sweet lately,” Minho teased, “Who are you?”

“Slim it,” He grinned, and they watched Gally clap his hand on Thomas’ shoulder as he left. Thomas grinned across in their direction before it settled onto something smaller, softer.

He clambered onto the bench again, all long limbs and incoordination, curling up at Newt's side.

They fall into a comfortable silence, relaxed as the waves rocking them; a lull. Newt begins to drop off, eyes growing heavy, and he would blame it on the pain meds that Brenda had forced him to take. In reality, he was simply just content, happy to sleep now that he felt safe enough to not have to think about it.

He can feel himself about to fall asleep completely, Thomas stroking the back of his neck and Minho tucked into his side before Minho speaks up.

“Who knew it'd take the three of us dying or - near enough - to bang?”

“ _Minho_!” Thomas hisses, and Newt doesn't bother opening his eyes to know that the yelp was Thomas thwacking his leg.

“Know what? I hate the both of you.” Newt grins, cracking one eye open to watch the last of the horizon disappear, getting nothing more than sleepy scoffs in response.

Yeah, he thinks, no, _knows_ they're going to be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> twitter is @PAULROVlA. come and say hi!


End file.
